We owe each other better - when women make birth and motherhood harder

There are lots of reasons women feel ashamed after giving birth.

The idealisation of a ‘normal birth’ (whatever that is). The system. The shocking lack of postnatal care. The pressure to “bounce back”. The way maternity services can make you feel like a problem to be quickly managed through a system rather than a human being who just gave birth.

But I want to name something else — something quieter, and honestly, more personal.

Sometimes the people who make birth and motherhood feel worse… are other women. I don’t think that this is intentional and not always malicious but it infused in lots of the language that we use, without deeper thought.

But the impact is the same.

Imagine the scenario where a woman finally says, “I’m not okay,” or “that birth scared me” and another woman replies with a variation on the following:

• “Well, that’s motherhood.”

• “Just wait until baby number two.”

• “At least you’ve got a healthy baby/a supportive partner/a lovely house”*

(*delete as appropriate, I have heard all three!)

• “You’ll forget about it.”

• “I did it without pain relief.”

• “Breastfeeding is natural, you just have to persevere.”

• “Have you thought about how bad it is for some other women?”

• “I didn’t have time to be depressed” (this won wins a special prize for being a unique blend of smug ignorance and total BS)

And there it is. A moment of risky honesty, a chink of vulnerability and shame creeps into the cracks.

By another woman.

And that is worth talking about

Birth is a uniquely female experience — and that matters

This isn’t about excluding anyone. Partners matter. Fathers matter. Families matter.

But birth is still, in the most literal sense, a uniquely female experience.

It happens inside a woman’s body. It changes her body. It changes her brain. It changes her identity. It changes her relationship with safety, with control, with pain, with trust, with her sense of self.

Even when it goes “well”, birth can still be shocking. Disorienting. Raw. Humbling.

And when it doesn’t go well — when it’s frightening, chaotic, invasive, rushed, dismissive, or simply not what she expected — it can leave an imprint that doesn’t fade just because the baby is fine.

That’s why the culture around women matters so much here.

Because women are often the only people who truly understand the stakes.

Which means women are also the ones with the greatest power to either soften the experience… or sharpen it.

Women don’t just share stories — we set the emotional rules

There’s a particular kind of conversation that happens between women after birth.

It’s not always cruel on the surface. It can even sound like bonding.

But it often has an edge.

A new mother shares something tender or painful, and instead of being met with care, she’s met with:

• comparison

• correction

• minimising

• “at least…”

• “you should…”

• “I would never…”

It turns motherhood into a performance, with invisible scoring:

Who suffered more.
Who coped better.
Who did it “properly.”
Who had the hardest birth.
Who had the least help.
Who sacrificed most.

And if you’re not careful, you end up learning the rules quickly:

Don’t say it was hard — someone will tell you it was harder for them.
Don’t say it was traumatic — someone will tell you you’re lucky.
Don’t say you hated it — someone will tell you to be grateful.
Don’t say you struggled — someone will tell you you’re weak/you need to ‘man up’.

So women stop talking. Or they talk, but only in safe little fragments. Or they dress it up in jokes and irony. Or they pretend. An dos the myth perpetuates and so does the shame.

“At least you’ve got a healthy baby” is not comfort — it’s silencing

Let’s be blunt: that phrase is one of the most socially acceptable ways to shut down a conversation about birth.

It sounds kind. It’s often meant kindly.

But what it actually communicates is:

Your feelings are inconvenient.
Your experience is less important than your outcome.
Your pain should be swallowed.

You’re now second-rate compared to your baby.

And the worst part is that it teaches women to doubt themselves.

They start thinking:

• “Maybe I’m being dramatic.”

• “Maybe I shouldn’t still feel upset.”

• “Maybe I’m ungrateful.”

• “Maybe I’m just not cut out for this.”

When actually, what’s happening is far simpler and far more human:

Something HUGE happened to them.

And they need to be able to say that out loud without being punished for it.

Why women do this (and yes, it’s often unprocessed pain)

When women make motherhood harder for other women, I think it’s usually because they’re carrying something.

Sometimes it’s trauma — unprocessed, unspoken, sitting in the nervous system like a live wire.

Sometimes it’s grief: for the birth they didn’t get, the support they didn’t have, the mother they thought they would be.

Sometimes it’s identity protection.

Because if you admit that birth can be traumatic, unfair, damaging, or deeply wounding — you also have to face what your birth did to you.

And not everyone is ready for that.

So instead, women turn their own survival into a badge.

They make a rule:

If I got through it, you should too.

Or worse:

If I suffered, you should suffer as well.

That’s not solidarity. That’s a hazing ritual.

And we see it everywhere in motherhood culture.

The “strong woman” myth is killing us quietly

There’s a type of mother who gets praised constantly. She’s the one who:

• copes

• doesn’t complain

• “just gets on with it”

• doesn’t need much

• doesn’t talk about her birth too much

• doesn’t make anyone uncomfortable

But, for me, that isn’t strength. It’s silence. It’s unnecessary and harmful self-censure.

It’s emotional starvation dressed up as resilience.

And then — because she’s never had her own experience held properly — she unintentionally becomes the person who can’t hold someone else’s.

So she says things like:

• “That’s just how it is.”

• “Welcome to motherhood.”

And we call it “real talk.”

But it’s not real talk.

It’s what happens when women have been so under-supported for so long that they start mistaking deprivation for normal.

The cost is that women go through the most vulnerable time of their lives feeling alone

This is what breaks my heart the most.

A woman can go through pregnancy and birth — one of the most intense physical and psychological transitions humans ever experience — and still feel like she has to keep her mouth shut.

Because other women will judge her for:

• being too emotional

• not coping

• wanting more support

• being traumatised

• having a caesarean

• not breastfeeding

• breastfeeding too long

• having a home birth

• having an epidural

• not bonding instantly

• missing her old life

Motherhood is already isolating.

But women often make it lonelier than it needs to be.

And that’s not inevitable. That’s culture.

And culture can change.

What if we made this the rule instead?

When a woman opens up to you—really opens up—it’s not an invitation to fix her. She’s not asking for a lesson, a lecture, or a correction of how she remembers her own story. What she needs most is to feel safe. That’s the whole job.

Birth and early motherhood aren’t moments for hierarchy or comparison. They’re not the time to keep score or to prove you’re somehow the “stronger” or “better” woman because of what you endured. Those early days are tender. They’re raw. And they call for care, not competition.

What she needs is presence. Softness. Someone who listens without trying to reshape her experience. Someone who lets her be exactly where she is.

Because that’s where healing begins.

What to Say Instead

If you’ve ever listened to a woman share something raw and vulnerable—and felt yourself panic, reaching for the nearest “acceptable” phrase—you’re in good company. Most of us were never taught how to hold someone gently in their pain.

So here are some alternatives. Softer. Kinder. Actually helpful.

Instead of: “At least you’ve got a healthy baby.” Try: “That sounds like a lot to carry. I’m really sorry.”

Instead of: “You’ll forget.” Try: “That makes sense. Birth can stay with you.”

Instead of: “That’s motherhood.” Try: “You deserve more support than this.”

Instead of: “Just wait…” Try: “What would help you most right now?”

Instead of: “I did it without…” Try: “You did what you needed to do.”

Instead of: “Well I had it worse.” Try: “I get it. I’ve been there too. You’re not alone.”

Instead of: “You should be grateful.” Try: “You can love your baby and still feel devastated by what happened.”

That last one is huge. Because one of the heaviest, quietest shames women carry is this: “If I’m traumatised, does that make me a bad mother?”

No. It makes you human.

We Don’t Need to Be Perfect. We Need to Be Safe.

Women don’t need more pressure. We don’t need to perform being the perfect mother, the perfect friend, the perfect feminist. But we do need to stop being unsafe with each other.

A woman who’s newly postpartum—bleeding, exhausted, hormonally crashing, emotionally split wide open—doesn’t need to be judged or corrected. She doesn’t need to be told how she should feel.

She needs to be held.

And women are uniquely equipped to do that for one another. We know the cost. We know the ache. We know the wordless parts.

So let’s actually show it. Let’s be the generation that makes this gentler—not by pretending it’s easy, but by refusing to make it lonelier.

A Gentle Note, If You’re Reading This Thinking: “This Is Me.”

If you’re carrying a birth story that still stings—if it loops in your mind, if you find yourself crying or getting angry when it surfaces—that isn’t weakness. That’s your nervous system trying to process something that mattered deeply.

Sometimes what helps isn’t advice. It’s understanding. It’s validation. It’s space to tell the story in a way that finally makes sense.

That’s the purpose of birth debriefing. Not to re‑live the pain, but to make meaning of it. To soften the edges. To help you feel like yourself again.

You deserve that.